


Unfolding Right Before My Eyes

by Telesilla



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Blanket Fort Day, Cuddling and Snuggling, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-01
Updated: 2007-03-01
Packaged: 2017-10-05 04:50:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/37988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telesilla/pseuds/Telesilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John's feelings about cuddling have come full circle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unfolding Right Before My Eyes

When John was a child, he didn't really make blanket forts all that often; turning the laundry basket into a jet or making a spaceship out of a recliner was more his thing. Forts were outside things, not made for curling up in but for launching snowballs from (if they were stationed in somewhere where there was snow), or water balloons (if Dad was doing a tour somewhere hot).

 

Every once in a while, though, usually if the weather was really bad or he was sick, John's mother would settle him on the couch with plenty of blankets and pillows. She'd read to him, the Babar books or maybe the Centerburg Tales, and he'd recite his favorite bits along with her. There would be grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup for lunch, and sometimes he'd help her with the laundry, folding washcloths and napkins. When his father came home, he'd smile to see them both on the couch and he'd usually go back out to bring home fried chicken or pizza so that Mom didn't have to cook.

 

After his mother died, John and his father ate a lot of fried chicken and pizza, but there was no time spent cuddling on the couch once they were past the immediate shock of her death. They never stayed in any one place long enough for John to really feel comfortable  
with any of the women hired to do the housework and take care of John in the increasingly long hours between the time he got home from school and his father came home. The housekeepers/babysitters were inevitably nice women, junior officer or NCO's wives with no children of their own, or, once in a while, some officer's college age daughter who was taking night classes, but John would still pull away when one of them tried to hug him too much.

 

When John started having girlfriends, he did his best to be physically affectionate because girls liked that sort of thing. It wasn't so hard in public; an arm around his girlfriend's waist or holding her hand during movies was fine. But it was a little weird when he'd end up alone with some girl, watching a video or something, and she'd curl up next to him under a blanket. He put up with it, usually because he hoped it would lead to making out, but he always felt just a little smothered.

 

Once John discovered sex with men, he liked that cuddling wasn't really a part of it. Fucking guys was kind of like a nice clean bombing run: you flew in, dropped your payload and got out. Although John didn't really think the comparison was all that funny when one of his buddies made it--largely because his father had flown bombers in Vietnam back before John was born and making any connection between his dad and gay sex was...well, yeah--he couldn't deny the truth behind the joke.

 

Right after he was sent to Antarctica, he had a few bad days when the weather or his schedule kept him from flying. While it wasn't the kind of thing he'd ever tell anyone, he spent some of those days curled up in bed just drifting through the hours in a kind of a doze, trying not to think about sand and blood and standing at attention in front of a series of desks. Time passed and he got to know more of the people stationed at McMurdo, and days off were spent hanging out with interesting people who understood the meaning of personal boundaries.

 

There was no time for cuddling or lounging or anything like that once he walked through the Stargate for the first time. Atlantis welcomed him, spreading her plumage like a peacock, but she was hardly built for cuddling, and that was just fine for John, who, if he'd thought about it--which he didn't--would have felt that a city that wanted to cuddle would be creepy in a "The Pit and the Pendulum" kind of way.

 

Unlike the people at McMurdo and most of the people in Atlantis--John really liked that Athosian head touching thing because it wasn't a hug--Rodney McKay didn't respect personal boundaries all that much. He wasn't exactly touchy feely, but he'd grab John's arm whenever he felt like it, or sit right down next to John at dinner with his thigh pressed right up against John's. The really weird thing was that John found himself getting used to Rodney encroaching into his space and even missing the feeling of that warm solid thigh against his when work in the labs kept Rodney away from the mess hall.

 

Once they tumbled into bed together--and looking back, John realized how inevitable that had been--John learned that Rodney in private was at least ten times more invasive than Rodney in public. After sex, he'd simply latch on to John as if he had every right to do so, even after he somehow scored a new room with a bigger bed--using the excuse that it was closer to the labs, although by then John didn't think either of them were really fooling anyone.

 

Rodney in bed was pretty much an attack cuddler, and it didn't take long before John realized that he might as well give in, because.... Well, first, because Rodney was pretty damn good in bed, and then, later, because John began to realize he had feelings for  
Rodney that went beyond the whole "friends with benefits" thing, and when you had feelings like that, you were supposed to compromise.

 

Late at night, lying in bed with Rodney curled up around and on him, and the smell of the ocean air from the windows mixing with the smell of sex, John thought that maybe, just maybe, cuddling really was something he wanted in his life again.

 

_-end-_

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [International Blanket Fort Day](http://telesilla.livejournal.com/530413.html), which is pretty much something I made up on the spur of the moment this morning--March 01, 2007--because my flist seemed to be collectively needing blanket forts. [_The Centerburg Tales_](http://www.amazon.com/Centerburg-Tales-Adventures-Homer-Price/dp/014031072X) are the second in the Homer Price series, a totally fun pair of kid's books about a boy growing up in a somewhat wacky town in the '30s. The title is from the song Underwater" by Delerium feat. Rani Kamal. Thanks go to my fantastic and speedy beta, [helens78](http://helens78.livejournal.com/).


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